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Reviews
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (2022)
So bad. So, so bad.
Unreasonable and unexplainable dialogue. Specifically, the writer's dialogue for Galadriel is abysmal, and the director's take on the character, as well as Morfydd's acting is one dimensional.
Why are all the men portrayed as idiots in this film? Except for the evil Sauron that is. Because his evilness takes away any sense of redeemable qualities I suppose.
Why did they have to strongarm different races into, well, all the races? Are we so insecure in every races' abilities to be themselves that they have to be inserted everywhere they normally aren't? Just for context, Tolkien's original world is very diverse, with races, creeds, and skin color represented in appropriate regions of the world. You know, sort of like the real world we live in today? Understandable, relatable, and LOGICAL writing should be the goal to make something truly successful. You know, like Tolkien did it. If you don't like Tolkien's original stories, characters, world demographics, why in the world (no pun intended) are you using it??
Who in their right mind would leave a very defensible and protected structure (tower) that provides a choke point and could be held with minimal numbers from an oncoming major army? The advancing army would have encounter major loses, but nah. Lets blow it up with a small portion of the invading army inside it leaving nothing to defend the choke point anymore to the rest of the advancing army! And lets go back to our town, which can be attacked from all sides and defend ourselves there. So much better. And let's not even get into how the heck they would have rigged that tower to collapse by shooting one measly rope. You telling me that rope was supporting the ENTIRE structure? OK.
There really are so many other oddities that they expected viewers to just accept. Like Galadriel jumping off the Elven ship and expecting to swim... somewhere... ? Seriously. Then she just so happens to get picked up by one other person on a raft, that just happens to be the main antagonist? And that antagonist is so transparent that viewers know who he really is within the next episode? And where in the heck did HE come from. The writers: 'Hmm, what if they question where he came from? Let's just let THEM come up with an explanation!' My gosh that is some absolutely lazy writing. So contrived.
There are just so many things wrong with this series, that even the one (sort of) positive thing I can say about it is completely cancelled out by;
- the lack of complexity to the plot
- poor writing, dialogue, and acting
- the sad attempts at creating 'strong female leads' in all parts of the story. Geez, give the female leads constructive, logical, and reasonable plot lines to advance their characters. You really did Morfydd and the other actresses a disservice with these shoddy lines and direction.
Oh, the one good thing are the visuals. Although not the best, as they lack proper lighting and coloring at times, the visual effects are good.
I really wanted to like this, and tried my best to look past things, but they truly did a horrible job. It's like they didn't listen to editors or constructive criticism, otherwise it never would have been released with so many weaknesses, inconsistencies, and outright failures to make the decisions of the actors realistic. And that isn't even saying anything about staying true to Tolkien's source material, as it is obvious that was not their goal.
Black Mountain Side (2014)
Nonsense
I'm not sure why others rated this above 5 stars, 4 is pushing it.
I gave two stars for mostly acceptable acting but the writing, dialogue, and plot all conspire against anything these actors can do for this movie.
There are empty, or dead end plot points, no idea how the men got infected, and their 'infection' is turning them into 'lots of little cephalopods' ?? What the?! After first questioning how they got infected, the next question was how in the world and with what equipment did the 'doctor' run the tests that showed this 'infection' in the men's bodies? Not that it matters, because absolutely nothing comes of that, so I guess the writer just expects you to forget about it.
And the 'deer god'? It's dialogue is even worse. Non-sensical speaking and 'making' the men do bad things simply because it is telling them to. No sense that there is any mind control, or some other sort of control, the men are just like, 'He is MAKING me do it because he it telling me to!'. I get that they were trying to add suspense seeing the men turn on each other, but it all came across as way too rushed without any good explanation of why things unraveled so quickly in their minds. Turns out the deer head on the wall was the one actually speaking to one of the men, making him crazy.
Then the lone survivor has an actual confrontation with the 'deer god' , who now has a body and legs in the forest - i was expecting some sort of 'charge' or some other threatening movement since it had legs now, but nope, just stood there talking. I am guessing the writer tried to make what the deer god was saying as deep and philosophical but it just came across as 'Uhhh, WTF you say?' Seriously, I stopped it to rewind to listen to again, thinking I missed something but nope. Just gibberish really.
Then the deer god lets the lone survivor go and ... well, he starts walking to ... the reservation?
Seriously, the premise had potential, wasted on horrible writing, dialogue, and purpose for the big baddy. Sad attempt at horror and suspense. Don't waste your time on this, you will regret the time you invested in it.